Orrin Hatch may just punch you in the mouth

posted at 10:46 am on April 14, 2012 by Jazz Shaw

Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) has been under a lot of pressure from his own right flank this cycle, facing a serious primary challenge from people who think he’s too “moderate” for today’s Republican Party. FreedomWorks has dropped more than a half million dollars in attack ads trying to knock him out of the running, hoping to replace him with former state Sen. Dan Liljenquist. But at least he’s taking it with the calm, professional demeanor that you’d expect from a seasoned, veteran statesman.

Utah Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch is “doggone offended” by the activists and voters standing between him and re-election, describing them as “radical libertarians.”

“I despise these people,” Hatch added, “and I’m not the guy you come in and dump on without getting punched in the mouth.”

According to the linked report from The Daily Caller, though, these efforts may come to naught. Liljenquist is underperforming in the caucuses, and if Hatch can scrape together 60% he won’t even face a primary vote in June, instead just sailing on to the general election. And that could turn out to be a long term problem.

No matter how enthusiastic you may be about “purging the RINOs” from the system, it doesn’t always work. And when it fails, why should somebody like Hatch feel any loyalty whatsoever to the party leaders when it comes time for a close vote? Tick the guy off enough and you’ve got another Olympia Snowe on your hands. In a worst case scenario, just think of a situation where the GOP takes back enough seats to just barely regain control of the Senate this fall. And then Hatch suddenly decides he feels more like being an independent caucusing with the Democrats after getting kicked around by his own team in the primary.

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Comments

Well, then, what are Republicans? They’re the country club neocon big govt war on drugs types.

“Republican” is an old-fashioned past-its-time tarnished country club brand, frowned upon by the bulk of independents. We need a party that Joe the Plumber can be proud of. A Republican today may win the presidency, or a seat in congress, but this not because of the Repub label, but despite it. Long term, we need to work to replace the Republican label.

No matter how enthusiastic you may be about “purging the RINOs” from the system, it doesn’t always work. And when it fails, why should somebody like Hatch feel any loyalty whatsoever to the party leaders when it comes time for a close vote? Tick the guy off enough and you’ve got another Olympia Snowe on your hands. In a worst case scenario, just think of a situation where the GOP takes back enough seats to just barely regain control of the Senate this fall. And then Hatch suddenly decides he feels more like being an independent caucusing with the Democrats after getting kicked around by his own team in the primary.

So, coddling them is the answer? For how long, maybe another 36 years (in Hatch’s case)?…

Fact of the matter is, we only have ourselves to blame. Congress has an approval rating in the TEENS. But come election time, how many incumbents are back in the saddle?

Too many of us only show up for the Presidential vote, and MAYBE for the midterm vote for governor. We’ve got to get more involved in the primaries. There’s a lot of spending-spree politicians out there taking our apathy for granted.

We are supposed to vote for Republican candidates out of fear for what they will do if we don’t show them enough love? It’s bad enough that we pay the blackmail to the Democrats and terrorists. We should at least have a haven from fear based decision making within the Republican Party, or else we should start a new party. It is through the primary process that we are attempting to salvage the Republican Party instead of going the new party route.

Buddahpundit on April 14, 2012 at 11:11 AM

I remember when the liberal Republicans told us that “the time to mount a challenge is during the primary.” Looks like they were lying about that too.

There’s a faction of the party that is doing real damage to Republicans and enabling Democrats. You can generally recognize them by the words “I’m a ‘conservative’, not a Republican” or some such drivel. In their seeming desire to move the party to the right, they end up moving it to the left.

The faction of the Republicans that is doing damage to the Republicans are the ones who are agreeing with the left, supporting the left, and most importantly voting with the left.

Blaming the people trying their best to stop this is incredibly Orwellian.

Most Americans are not far right or far left. They aren’t “far” anything. Most Americans are center right. They want their tax dollars spent responsibly, they want people to act with self-responsibility, they generally want to be left alone on social issues and done want either social agenda shoved down their throats, and generally want the federal government to keeps its nose out of their bedroom and is fingers out of their wallets.

crosspatch on April 14, 2012 at 11:52 AM

People who have the point of view you are describing are generally dismissed as right wing extremist wingnut TruConz. Supposedly, the
“moderate” position is big government (but just growing slower), liberal social policy, and incoherent “feelings based” foreign policy.